I thought I had tracked it down, but my memory has apparently failed me.
Story details: short story likely in a book of short stories. I am fairly certain I read it sometime in the 70s, so it wouldn’t be any newer than that. Story concerns a family with 2 children (older brother & younger sister, or vice versa). Children are probably elementary-school or pre-school age. I think somehow some device from the future comes into the children’s lives in some manner - some kind of teaching toy that the children begin to learn from. The children begin not only to learn things far in advance of modern civilization, but they are probably being made smarter and smarter as they go (this statement may not be entirely accurate; fuzzy memory). In the end, the children create some complex pattern on the floor, and follow it in a direction heretofore unknown to our poor can-only-comprehend-3-dimensions brains. The father discovers them just as they are disappearing, his mind unable to fully understand where they are going (another possibly-fuzzy detail). The story ends very shortly thereafter.
For the longest time, I had thought this story was contained within the anthology Tomorrow’s Children, edited by Isaac Asimov. However, I recently obtained a copy of that book and it doesn’t seem to be there. There is a similar story, Star Bright, but I honestly don’t think it’s the story I have in mind. In this story, the father doesn’t actually see the children disappear, while I could almost swear the story I’m describing has such a scene. What I recall is the exposition explaining how the children vanished by going in a direction that the father could not comprehend, his consciousness not having been ‘trained,’ as the children’s were, by the teaching toy.
Anyone have any ideas? I will be most grateful for any assistance rendered, and thanks in advance.
